She had been busy with other matters besides her packing,
while la bella Madonna and her suite were collecting adorers on the
heights of Eze.
Evelyn and Rosemary disappeared to take off their hats before the grand
presentation ceremony should begin, and Hugh had begun to occupy the
time of their absence by lighting the fire with pine cones, when a cry
from the beloved voice called him to the room adjoining.
The door was open, and the woman and the child stood dumbfounded and
overwhelmed in a scene of incredible desolation.
The air was acrid with the smell of burning. Blouses, pink and green,
and cream, and blue, were stirred into a seething mass in the fireplace,
as in a witch's cauldron, their fluffy laces burnt and blackened.
Chiffon fichus torn in ribbons strewed the carpet. An ivory fan had been
trampled into fragments on the hearth-rug, and a snow-storm of feathers
from a white boa had drifted over the furniture. On the wash-stand a
spangled white tulle hat lay drowning in a basin half full of water.
[Illustration: Their fluffy laces burnt and blackened.
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